


A Very Attractive Person

by asuralucier



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Asphyxiation, Chocolate Box Exchange 2019, Flirting, M/M, Murder Husbands, Post-Canon, Psychobabble, Roleplay, dom!will, identity crisis
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-16
Updated: 2019-02-16
Packaged: 2019-10-13 13:17:28
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,239
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17488736
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/asuralucier/pseuds/asuralucier
Summary: Will Graham is a terrible flirt.





	A Very Attractive Person

**Author's Note:**

  * For [resident_longwinded_anon](https://archiveofourown.org/users/resident_longwinded_anon/gifts).



> Thanks to ictus for the beta!
> 
> To @resident_longwinded_anon: Basically post-canon porn with some posturing and dom!Will (which did all kinds of things to me that I didn’t know I liked). I’m terrible with the canon so I have conflated your prompts and have written something set after. I hope you enjoy!

“You know Will, that’s popular with swingers,” Hannibal says. 

Will says, “What?” 

“Pretending to pick up one’s partner as if they are strangers; the bar is so unimaginative but that’s what everyone tends to go for. It’s very popular with swingers.” 

“I heard you the first time,” Will straightens up from his previous slouch against the counter. He paces the confines of their very small kitchen, where Hannibal insists on making them gazpacho, dicing fresh red and green peppers, cucumber, scallion, and fat garlic cloves. They might have had to acquaint themselves with squalor, but that doesn’t mean they have to eat like paupers. Hannibal finds that he has very little principles nowadays, but still, he would never stoop to consuming swill or food otherwise more fit for the trough of a pig. “What do you know about swinging, anyway?” 

“Nothing firsthand,” Hannibal returns, holding the younger man with a steady gaze. “It may surprise you, but swinging exposes an inordinate amount of sexual insecurity in a man, for which therapy is an apt, if expensive balm. Women too, but it’s mostly men, by a large margin.” 

Will manages to hold his gaze, until a telling red catches in his cheeks and he turns away again, “That doesn’t surprise me. -- Are we partners? Are you suggesting that I pick you up?” 

Their kitchen is the state in which they mean to go on. Adjoining the kitchen is something that passes for a sitting room, with rat bitten carpet and a couch that sags on its own without any help. The washroom and a bedroom that is just as threadbare aren’t much better. When they’d collected the keys from the super, the mattress didn’t even have a mattress topper. 

_“And that’s the hill you want to die on, is it?” Will said, without missing a beat._

_Will’s continuous willingness to “call Hannibal out on his bullshit” -- Will’s own exact words -- suffused Hannibal’s guts and his lungs with_ love _, and yet Hannibal had to conclude that love was was too simple for the multivalent synapses shooting off in his brain at what seemed a million miles per minute._

_“You say that as if our previous deaths weren’t exciting enough. What’s wrong with a mundane death?”_

_“Nothing,” Will shrugged. “Except that you are inordinately incapable of mundane.”_

“...You could, that is, pick me up,” Hannibal says, dipping a wooden spoon into the slightly rusted saucepan. “Here, have a taste.” 

Hannibal can see the hesitation, before it reaches the tips of Will’s fingers, start from the base of the man’s spine and winnowing languidly throughout the rest of him stopping stilted just short of touch.

“Despite my perfectly justified complaints about the state of this kitchen, you can see that I’m trying my best, Will. Taste. It’s not as if I’d feed you poison.”

“That would be impolite,” Will agrees. His intonation is flat enough that Hannibal would struggle to differentiate between a not-so-flattering parody or a Pavlovian response. Will takes the spoon and gives its contents an experimental sniff. “I don’t think I’ve ever had Gazpacho. Isn’t it supposed to be served cold?” 

Hannibal says, “You’re looking for warmth. And a bit of a kick from the Spanish chilli. This is the winter variant. It doesn’t stop being Gazpacho simply because you don’t recognize it. I don’t doubt many people think of this in these terms but the myriad of ways food can be prepared and consumed is testament enough to the resilience of the human condition.”

“So you don’t think I’m going crazy?” Will fixes him with a steady look. 

The question doesn’t sound much like a trap but Hannibal is the first to admit that he has now oddly attuned to Will’s thinking. It’s not as crazy or impractical or as obsessive as common opinion would have one believe. Will, after all, was the one who tracked him and Bedelia via Hannibal’s favorite white wine and his preferred butcher. In a world so keenly without imagination, where one’s sense of self is instead delegated and outsourced, it seems only a bit like hubris, that Will had found him out on account of _good taste_. 

“In what capacity are you asking me this question?”

WIll shrugs, “Whichever one of you who is more liable to tell me the truth. And not that I need to get into the swing of things to feel like my old self.” 

Hannibal sighs. Even a blind man can see that Will hasn’t been happy, not lately. A part of him wonders, whether or not Abigail Hobbes might have alleviated this unhappiness in another version of the lives they are living now, but that ship has long sailed. He takes the spoon from WIll again and drops it in the pot. 

“It’s quite normal that you feel this way. You’re grappling with a slew of large-scale changes out of your control. But isn’t it better that you’ve gotten to keep your name, Will?” 

(Will’s new passport, simply because Hannibal considered a working passport a cornerstone of any working identity, proclaimed him as one William Richard Parry, an Ottawa native. The passports had been bought for a pretty price from a man named Sebastião. Sebastião had clever hands and a good gut that told him when to forget how to speak English, or French, or any of the five languages he spoke fluently. It was Sebastião who suggested Will brush up on his hockey know-how and even recommended Will a guidebook readily available in a number of tourist outlets.)

“I suppose that’s one way to look at it,” Will says, mostly unconvinced. “But it’s also on the account of being a ‘Will,’ that I feel less and less myself. I’ll have secrets from everyone the rest of my life, however long or short it might end up being.” He rolls his shoulders again, as if he is trying to shake off the excesses of other people from off of his bones.

“But you’ve always had secrets from other people,” Hannibal points out. Usually, he tries his best not to subscribe to anything too Socratic. He finds the whole method indulgent and averse to challenging thought. “Certainly me, Alanna, Jack.” Hannibal feels that he ought to name more innocent parties, so that he doesn’t stand alone. 

“But I had a _choice_ ,” Will says, a bit forcefully that his voice nearly cracks. “And those weren’t secrets, they were just…” 

“Things that you hold over other people,” Hannibal supplies. “So that you know it’s them you’re talking to; you know the power you hold over them. No one else.”

“I was going to say that secrets kept you safe,” Will doesn’t look at him. 

“You spent a good part of our acquaintance attempting to kill me,” Hannibal points out gamely. Will Graham is privy to his patience, but there’s no denying the facts. “Do you think that kept me safe?” 

“I don’t think it’s any worse than what you did,” Will says. “And it didn’t work, so.” 

Will is bubbling. Hannibal suspects the man is trying to take the high road, because that’s something that he knows how to do. Something that is undeniably Will Graham and not William Parry, a shell of a person. 

“Do you know why I bring up swinging, Will?” 

Will gestures with his hands, “No, Dr. Lecter, illuminate me.” 

“Contrary to what I told you before, despite swinging causing men considerable anxiety, those who participate in the activity are often the _creme de la creme_ of upper society. Financiers, attorneys, executives. It’s because what’s on display in the moment of posturing isn’t immediately made intangible by statistics or indeed, some corporate legal department. It’s because they are naked and have little else to fall back on. Is that not the most terrifying thing in the world?” 

Will lifts one side of his mouth, “Would it be terrifying to you?” 

“Undoubtedly,” Hannibal says. “But it’s a rush, and maybe even therapeutic, you might find, when done right. Would you like me to show you?” 

 

Will Graham doesn’t feel Canadian, which is understandable because ice hockey translates to little else, aside from senseless violence and an alarming statistic on sustained concussions. He’s done enough years at the FBI to not find those things the slightest bit entertaining. Will is, admittedly, not much for sports save tennis. Hannibal once ribbed him for liking something mundane as _tennis_ , but Will thinks that Hannibal secretly likes tennis. It’s got a bit of everything that the man likes. Elitism, snobbery, all the way down to the mindfuck. 

Will is aware, of course, that asking Hannibal for advice might not seem like the best thing to do. He doesn’t think that swingers’ tactics will go a long way toward addressing his insecurities, but if there is anything that Hannibal is good at, it’s piquing Will’s curiosity. 

When Will wakes up again, mildly groggy from the Ativan that Hannibal has procured from somewhere, he pads into the kitchen and finds a note pinned on the fridge. The paper is made of good stock, good _tasteful_ stock, and Will feels the odd texture at his fingertips. A man is little else but a collection of knowable habits. 

The note reads simply: _Come pick me up._ Then an address that Will doesn’t recognize underneath. 

Still, it is precisely because Will is a creature of habit, other habits which are both natural to him and not, that he showers and dresses and leaves the apartment with the note folded in his pocket. 

From the outside, it doesn’t seem as if the address is really Hannibal’s scene. But Hannibal is nothing if not a believer in his own medicines, even if his personal opinion on psychiatry is cynical at best. A commercial block, with telling neon lights on the second floor. There’s also loud terrible music leaking out into the street, undoubtedly telling Will this is where he ought to be. 

Will gets in without further fanfare, although the guy at the door insists on going through WIll’s pockets and confiscating his gum. As far as Will can tell, while this club doesn’t exactly have features common with other things usually found in Hannibal’s orbit, there are hints of _taste_ , as if the man hardly knows how to do without. Will might start with the brickwork, or the smooth countertops fitted with European-styled beer taps. Will orders a beer and pays. The bartender looks about twenty and just relieved to make a buck, as Will hands over a ten dollar bill and tells the kid to keep the change. Will hasn’t thought much about William Parry beyond the guy’s penchant for ice hockey. Maybe he’ll just take the easy route and say that William Parry is a banker with money to burn and brimming with fuck you. 

The music is loud and insistent and _different_ , if Will is using Hannibal as a yardstick. But he supposes the sort of beat thumping the place is readily available via cultural osmosis. 

While Will’s more intimate faculties long to tell him that this is a lost cause, but something else wins over and he finds himself sweeping the space for Hannibal. At this point, Will can’t deny that he is curious, more than anything else. Usually, he’d have no problem spotting someone like Hannibal in a crowd, but he supposes that different is what they’re both going for today. 

“...This doesn’t look like your usual scene, if you don’t mind me saying,” says a familiar voice from somewhere behind him. Will doesn’t think he means to really hear Hannibal’s voice above the din, but it’s like he can’t help but attune to the man like a radio frequency. 

Will presses a hand to his temple and tries to block out the deep thrum of the music. Maybe that’s something else about William Parry too, that he gets unspeakable headaches from dealing with unreasonable clients all day. But, despite that, Parry’s a bit not well in the head, so he always likes to push the envelope and see how much noise he could stand to take. Parry is, to put it kindly, an _adventurer_. 

“I didn’t know you owned anything without a collar,” Will says, pivoting a neat half-circle on his heels. A man who most definitely looks like Hannibal is standing near his elbow. Yet this Hannibal looks at home and not at all posturing with a dark t-shirt with a band logo, and then a black leather jacket that seems to flatter the line of his torso without trying. 

“Have we met before?” Hannibal cocks his head. 

“I,” Will shorts. “...I could have you mixed up with someone else,” he returns lamely and drinks more beer. “I’m sure you’d find it flattering. My friend is a very attractive person.” 

Hannibal’s mouth quirks, “...Does he know that? That you think he’s an attractive person?” 

Will drains the rest of his beer, “Fuck knows. Probably. He’s the most perceptive person I know.” 

“But you look plenty perceptive yourself,” Hannibal says. He digs out a packet of black Dunhills from the front pocket of his jacket. “Smoke? You must forgive me. The music is making me a bit deaf.” 

 

The club boasts an outdoor smoking deck, which is mostly deserted except for a twenty-something couple necking determinedly in the corner. Hannibal leads Will to the opposite corner and offers him a cigarette. 

“I’ve always thought about starting,” Will says, fingering the length of the cigarette before he sticks it into his mouth. “But then I was waiting for my life to become shit enough. Maybe it finally has.” 

“If I were a lesser man, I’d be offended,” Hannibal says. 

“I don’t think you could be less if you tried,” Will says, and he thinks that he could have said that better. Flirting is not one of his strong suits. Will doesn’t think that’s so much of a surprise, either, given that the last of these overtures was ridiculed and rejected, on account of his mental health. 

“You seem to hold your friend in high regard.” 

“That’s the way friends work, though, doesn’t it? When you don’t have many. You want so desperately to be seen, to be found to be an object of value that you just want to give bits yourself away.” 

Hannibal inhales deeply and looks away from him, “Is there any of you left?” 

“I try to keep the bits of me that I don’t mind to myself,” Will shrugs. “So I suppose that’s always something. I’m William, by the way.” 

“Not Will, then?”

“Back in university, maybe,” Will admits, mentally fitting Will Parry into some ill-suited Greek-life fraternity where faceless collegiates cowed his name. “I’ve done a bit of growing since. I work in a bank; there’s not a lot of...say, excitement in my life. I might be looking to change that.” 

And yet, in their sudden proximity, Will is keenly aware that Hannibal is looking at him down the tip of his nose, as if he’s intensely curious, as if he doesn’t know everything about Will already. What was the word Hannibal had used? -- Ah, yes, Will is feeling _naked_. 

Will watches as Hannibal flicks the butt of his cigarette onto the ground, stubbing it out with the toe of his very nice shoes. Then he touches Will’s shoulder, pressing his fingers in enough to make a dent in the fabric of Will’s shirt right down to his bones.

Hannibal says, his voice practically shimmering with dark promise, “I know all about excitement.” 

 

Before tonight, they’ve had sex exactly twice. Once in a dingy hotel room on top of a broken mattress, and another time in the restroom of a filling station. The timing never really seemed right even if the exercise itself seemed like an inevitability. According to Hannibal, the inevitability was only natural, because “sex was an exercise in the purest form of honesty.” In that even if you were trying to deceive yourself or whomever it was you were in coitus with, you still ended up telling the truth.

Their rented apartment still is laboring under the same veneer of shit, but Will thinks that there is a freshness about it suddenly, that starts from deep within his ribcage down to his groin. When Hannibal touches him, it’s not the touch of a man who knows every inch of his mind and his body; this is a man who sees something something more, not just flesh and bone and man, in Will(iam) Parry. This Hannibal doesn’t rush to imprint what he already knows onto Will’s body. He just takes his time, and any weirdness that might have come with Will exposing his scars to Hannibal dissipates almost naturally into something else.

“...Are you nervous, William?”

Come to think of it, Will has never really questioned some of Hannibal’s proclivities. Other things, like serial murder, like Hannibal’s cannibalism has always taken precedence in Will’s brain as things to note. So little of his life makes sense now that it is only right that in that madness, that he thinks to question it -- that is, Hannibal’s previous experience with men. Will is not exactly a novice at this himself -- anymore, but there is a surety to the way Hannibal moves his fingers, and certainly his mouth. Will closes his eyes and lets out a sigh.

“...Should I be?”

Hannibal lets him go with an audible plop, “Depends. You do look like a man who hardly knows how to enjoy himself.”

“I enjoy myself just fine,” Will swallows. “So long as you put your mouth back where it was.”

There’s a spark in Hannibal’s eye, a challenge. “Are you telling me what to do now, Will?”

A lucid sort of warmth (with a kick!) snakes its way lazily up Will’s spine. Hannibal has given up the pretense, and finally, finally, being honest. Somehow, Will feels himself letting go of something. Maybe a breath, that he has been holding in for a very long time without knowing. “Yes, if only because I know you’d like it.”

“Maybe,” Hannibal demurs. “I won’t know until I’ve tried it for myself. It’s so sad, I think, when assumptions are what makes a person.”

And that must have been what did it because something else, along with the breath, snaps into place like it’d been there all along. Because everything else, Will thinks, is easy. Easy like an inhale and then the exhale that comes after it without fail, without thought.

From there, it is also easy to press Hannibal down into the creaking mattress and wrap his fingers around the man’s throat because if Will is still honest, part of him will probably always want to do this. He doesn’t squeeze too hard and the rest of Hannibal is easy too, after a fashion. He slides onto Will like skin and skin and it’s difficult to tell who is fooling who. The way Hannibal grips Will’s wrists and the way Will is very careful not to crush Hannibal’s trachea tells of something deeper than the negotiation of certain boundaries. They are two people in between themselves. Not one, but in-between.

In the end, honesty is the same, and Will allows himself to enjoy it very much, the way Hannibal makes to tremble against him.

Hannibal says, “Feel better, Will?”

With endorphins coursing through his body, Will reaches to press his thumb knowingly against Hannibal’s spine, “Yes, I think so.”


End file.
